Thanksgiving and Being with the Provo Dunfords

At home, I usually had a lot of Halloween and Thanksgiving decorations out.  Things are much simpler here.  It has been so great having two of our children and their families living in Provo while we are on our mission.

Every other Friday night when Heather has BYU school down in Salt Lake, she spends the night here at Bert's with us, sleeping on the couch.  It has been so special having her these nights and hopefully lightening her life a little.

We don't know if we would have ever spent Thanksgiving at Heather's if we weren't serving a mission out here.  She is so generous to host both us and Bryan's family for so many Sunday meals.

One day in December, we took Grace on a morning out.  We took her to the Salt Lake City Public Library which was a place that she had wanted to go for awhile.  We hadn't been there, so it was a new adventure for us as well.

The library has an amazing atrium with an outside glass elevator.  On the main floor are a number of interesting, artsy stores, including a coop art gallery, a garden shop and the library bookstore.

And we finished by looking through a beautiful architecture book!

Fall Activities with Rob's Family

We have enjoyed spending time with Rob's family during these first few months that we have been out in Utah.

Melissa's son, Gayle and Ron, Melissa and Stewart, us

Smiles with Gloria!

Every year, his sister Carolyn hosts an apple tasting party for family and friends.  She had over 20 different kinds of apples for us to sample and to vote on our favorites.  She had yummy caramel sauce to dip them in as well.  Although the apples are the focus, the family is really what counted.  It was a nice, casual atmosphere in which we could just sit and visit.

Carolyn, Gloria, me, Judy, and Annette

In November, Jill invited the sisters-in-law to lunch, something that she has wanted to do her whole married life.  Although they weren't all able to make it, it was a special time to just chat and visit. She feels that she has the best sisters-in-law!

In addition, we have been able to visit Gayle and Randon in their home in Midway and were glad to see her doing well after her stroke about a year ago.

So Many Things to Do on Temple Square

One night after a late day of work, we were able to pop in for a few minutes to the Conference Center to listen to the Tabernacle Choir rehearse.  They are such prepared musicians.  Even as they began to rehearse a new song, everyone seemed to already have everything down perfect.  Of course, with their having such a short turn-around to perform, it does require excellent singers who put in a lot of rehearsal time before they meet together. 

Of course, there is Music and the Spoken Word on Sunday mornings.  We have only attended two times since we have been here (the other missionaries that we serve with usually attend every time.  But it is over at 10, and since we are not living downtown, we don't have anything to do before our 1 pm meetings start.  So we have only gone on two special occasions.



Joy's husband Willy had never attended a Sunday morning performance even though Joy sang in the Tabernacle Choir for a number of years before they were married.  We thought she would have brought him before. So we were grateful that we were able to help them get there.

The first of November we sent to a delightful Organ Fest with six tabernacle choir organists performing. They are so skilled, and we don't often get to see them perform by themselves.

 Besides enjoying the concert, we also learned afterwards that Bryan designed the light system in the Tabernacle for his senior project when he was at BYU! We never even knew that.  So now when we see them, we are even more impressed...

.We have found Temple Square to be such a wonderful place to find fun activities for our spare time.